End of Line
by Cmdr's Monkey
Summary: Surely Clu was far too clever to just allow himself to be reintegrated w/o a contingency plan in place? The Creator certainly expected him to find a way to cheat deresolution & so Kevin Flynn prepared a contingency plan for Clu's contingency plan.
1. End of Line?

_Greetings Programs! New to Tron fiction and with the new movie, my old fascination with the world has been repurposed from the other obsessions of mine to Tron. Anyway, as I was eating dinner at a local restaurant, an idea struck me concerning Clu and Flynn and the ending of the movie. I felt that Clu was far too smart to not consider a back up plan should Flynn ever decide to reintegrate him. Therefore a plot was concocted while I ate a bacon cheeseburger and typed away on my Iphone to jot the idea down before I lost it. Heh._

**Chapter One**

_**End of Line?**_

** The Portal, Sea of Simulation**

"Good bye, kiddo." He whispered to the Son. But the sight of The Creator's son was obscured with the profile of the corrupted Program known only as Clu as the creation made one last attempt to get to the other side through the now open portal. Behind him, the gateway lowered to give passage to the Rectifier that carried Clu's invasion force. He could not allow Clu or the Rectifier through to spread the Grid and destroy the world beyond. The Creator had hoped it would not have come to this but knew it might come to pass. There was no choice now and a sacrifice had to be made to save not only His Son and the last ISO, but the world of the Users as well.

So he knelt down on the retracted bridge and placed the tips of his fingers before him on the smooth, onyx surface and used the powers bestowed upon him to stop the corrupted program and save everything. A wave of energy erupted from his being and like a magnet, grasped the persistent and stubborn Clu in an invisible grip far too strong for the Program to resist against.

With a defiant cry of protest, Clu was yanked back toward the epicenter of the tidal force and the open arms of the man who was going to finally erase him as well as himself. With the last micro-cell having finally reintegrated, an eruption of the likes that no Program or User had ever seen before exploded outward, derezzing everything in its path instantaneously...

**The Safehouse, the Outlands**

When the brightness of the explosion on the distant horizon over the Sea of Simulation had finally faded from sight and all that remained was the luminescent glow of the active Portal, Kevin Flynn turned away from the sight with a pleased but sad smile and stared past the Outlands to the distant Tron City. The sacrifice of the Flynn program gave him a comforting knowledge that his son had managed to escape with Quorra and Clu's plans for world domination had been momentarily stopped. It was enough to allow him to accept his fate with only one regret to plague him for the next thousand cycles.

It was not over.

It would never be over.

"Your move old friend."

**Control Center, Tron City**

"End of Line subroutine commencing," a disembodied female voice announced in a pitch black chamber that was slowly brightening with orange circuitry illumination. The darkness was pushed back with each light activating until a Resolution pod was highlighted on either side with a stripe. With a hiss, the pod opened just as the last micro-cell completed its rezzing and the figure stepped out into the chamber for the first time.

A dormant siren stepped forward with a Disk and efficiently attached it to the back of the unlit Program and once more the disembodied voice spoke as the lightsuit lit up with the same color orange as the chamber in which it stood in. "Upload and synchronization completed."

"It is safe to assume with the activation of the End of Line subroutine, that the Creator had successfully reintegrated Clu 2.0, resulting in both of their demise?" The Program rhetorically inquired but the only other Program in the room that could have replied said nothing as she stepped back into her stasis pod. He watched her return to hibernation before he turned away and headed out of the only door in the chamber. He needed answers and the only way he could do that was to access the Grid.

As soon as he stepped out of the Resolution chamber, two of the Black Guard flanked him and the one on the right handed him a baton which he quickly holstered on his leg. A few millicycles later they were met with a small retinue of Programs. "Send a Recognizer unit out to Flynn's Safehouse. I need confirmation of his status."

"At once Your Excellency," replied a red striped Program that wore a matching, flowing cloak and a transparent face guard over dark hair, brown eyes and a squarish face. "Though might I suggest a Recognizer also be sent out to the Portal to investigate the explosion that happened there twelve microcycles ago?"

He narrowed his eyes at this news. "Do so. Find out the status of the Rectifier and the Portal Gateway. Report their findings to me immediately on both inquiries." The Program was about to turn and obey the instructions he had been given when his superior spoke once more. "One more thing Risk."

The Program faced him again, waiting to hear what other instructions were to be given.

"Yes?"

"See to it I am not disturbed for the next millicycle."

"As you command, Clu." The red illuminated Program turned away with a flourish of his cloak and the small retinue followed after him, leaving the System Administrator alone with his two personal guard. Clu paid no heed to the departing Program. Risk would find out what he needed to know, to fill in the gaps left after the last backup of his Disk had been made. The rest of the information he could find out within the control center, the very heart of Tron City and the Grid and that is where he was presently headed now.

From there he could continue forward from whatever setbacks the Creator had caused his predecessor and create the perfect system within the Grid and from without the Grid. And as long as he had the ability to create a backup copy of his Disk's coding through the End of Line subroutine, the Creator and any other User would never be able to derezz him permanently and stop his directives from happening.

Like the ISOs before them, the Users would eventually face deresolution.

It was inevitable.

It was their end of line.

_So there is Clu and Flynn's backup plans to their own "deaths". Ha! Clu thought he was being clever. Anyway, in case you were wondering. No he did not create a new program, more like he repurposed another program, uploaded his own coding and data into that program thus overwriting the old coding and allowing himself to exist again._


	2. Safehouse

_Here is the next chapter, completely written on my iPhone yet again while eating lunch somewhere, lol. Seem to get most of my ideas while eating lately. 0_o_

**Chapter Two**

_**Safehouse**_

**Outside Safehouse, the Outlands**

The Outlands were a dangerous and barren wasteland where no Program could survive for very long on it's own. There were many ways a derezz could happen to a wandering Basic. Infection and re-resolution into a Grid Bug, energy starvation, or simply taking a wrong step off a sheer face cliff. But for a User it was much different. A User could survive out there so long as he could digitize himself whatever he needed.

Energy would be easy to come by.

Shelter could be easily made.

And the Grid Bugs? Not a worry. Sure they could hurt a User, but that was all they could do. That didn't mean Kevin Flynn was willing to deal with one regardless. So as soon as a tiny green, luminescent one began to approach him, he tossed a digitized rock at it to send it scurrying on it's way back into the darkness of the Outlands.

Returning his attention back to his home for the last thousand cycles, Flynn watched as the Recognizer settled at the cliff base of the Safehouse and lower it's cockpit to the jagged surface. Two sentries and a red highlighted figure stepped out and entered the equivalent of a garage. He knew why they were here and what they were looking for and knew he could not stay around for very much longer. The Black Guard would only find evidence that he had been there in the form of an empty Safehouse and nothing else. If they followed their protocols they would fan out and search the immediate area for any sign of him and again they would find nothing, not even a single trace of the path he could have taken.

He intended to be long gone before that though, but his curiosity was the only thing keeping him from leaving now while they made their way into his home. A few microcycles later he caught a glimpse of the crimson figure and watched as the Program stepped out onto the balcony and scan the horizon, obviously searching for his quarry but seeing nothing in the darkness of the wasteland. Flynn was glad he had taken the precaution of deactivating the lighting on his clothing. Out here it would have been a dead give away.

He wondered which of the many lieutenant programs that Clu had under his command, the crimson figure was and wondered if it was now in charge of the System with Clu gone or if it was Clu himself. He knew Clu could not create new programs, only re-purpose existing ones and Flynn would not put it past the corrupt Program to re-purpose another for a new body. It was a matter of backing up his Disk and overwriting the code of the old program with his own, something akin to a Grid Bug.

A virus.

So was this Clu or one of his lieutenants? It did not look or behave like Clu though.

"Kevin Flynn! We know you are here and we will find you! Clu has all the cycles in the Grid to wait!" called the crimson Program. When he received no answer, not surprising, he spun on his heel and returned to searching the Safehouse. The Creator knew now was the time to move on and keep as much distance between himself and Clu's minions.

At least he now knew that the figure was not Clu.

**Safehouse, the Outlands**

The User was not here.

In fact there was nothing remaining of the man's furnishings and keepsakes that the files had described having been here. All that remained were the barren white walls and lights that made up the structure.

"He had been expecting us," concluded Risk out loud as he slowly walked around the empty living quarters of the Creator. "The only question now is how much of a head start does he have?"

He had tried to see if he could spot a distant light in the Outlands against the backdrop of the darkness, signifying the location of the User but there had been only the darkness and the distant lights of Tron City. There had been no sign of the User and if the man had a good start on them there was the chance that he could have made it as far as the city itself by now.

With nothing else remaining to investigate here, Risk hurried past the sentries in the room and headed for the elevator; the sentries quickly falling into step around him and riding the illuminated elevator back down. They returned to the Recognizer in silence and the lieutenant gave orders for the pilot to head for the Gateway.

Had he taken that moment to look through the transparent flooring, he would have noticed a small shadow amongst the rocks as the Recognizer flew overhead. It's own lighting providing enough illumination to the reveal things hidden in the darkness of the Outlands. But he had not and the hidden shadow went unnoticed by the Programs as they headed for the remains of the Gateway and User Portal.

**Outside Safehouse, the Outlands**

Kevin watched as the Recognizer flew overhead and he huddled closer to the stone outcropping in order to avoid being seen by the Programs on board. But when the machine continued on without pausing or landing, he let out the breath he had not realized he had been holding. It had been close, too close. He had expected the sentries to start searching the surrounding area instead of just boarding the Recognizer and leaving.

"Guess they figured you were long gone, Flynn," he spoke to himself and watched as the patrol ship shrank into a distant orange speck on the horizon. He noted they were heading toward the Gateway Portal over the Sea of Simulation and suspected that Clu, the new Clu, was trying to piece together what had happened his predecessor. Assuming, of course, he was right about the Program creating a backup disk of himself and uploading it into a new body.

_He'll be busy for a while then._ Flynn stood from his hiding place, dusted off pixels of dust from his leggings and reached down for the light staff he had stolen from a guard aboard the Rectifier before heading back here. He wished he had been at the Portal, had escaped with his son and Quorra but knew that so long as the Grid existed there was a chance that the threat it contained could break out.

That Clu could break out.

He could not let that happen. He could not let the mad program reach his world and reshape it into what he saw as the perfect system. This was his creation and he intended to take responsibility for it, and if that meant for him to continue a lonely vigil over it for the rest of his life, then he was resigned to that fate.

Thinking back on the moment he made the decision not to escape with Sam and Quorra, he realized he had another regret besides his little war with Clu never being over. He regretted making the decision not to escape. _What is done is done, dwelling on past decisions will not change the past nor the future._

The Creator shook his head and started to make the long trek to relocate to somewhere else in the Outlands to live. His old home was no longer secure and it would have been unwise on his part to stay, even if Clu believed he no longer lived there.

_Next chapter will reveal how Flynn survived, though I'm certain by now you've figured it out on your own. If not, well things will be cleared up soon._


	3. Flynn 2

_I really hate auto speller. It keeps wanting to write Clu as Clue. XD_

**End of Line**

**Chapter 3**

_**Flynn 2.0**_

**Control Center, Tron City**

A millicycle had passed before the chime announced that he had a visitor and therefore disturbing him. He waited several nanocycles before he allowed the Program admittance. The door snapped back to reveal one of his many lieutenants and the Program entered briskly. He gave his superior a sharp nod of the head as a form of a salute of respect. He was not Risk or even Jarvis, Clu had noted, which meant that the scouts he had sent to investigate had yet to return.

"What is it?" he inquired from where he sat, in his hand two Baoding balls slowly rolled against each other. Laying on a small table nearby were unlit databytes that he had read through earlier in an attempt to learn the status of the Grid.

Least to say, he was not pleased with what he had learned.

"A report from Risk has arrived concerning the Gateway." The Program approached his unmoving superior and held out a databyte for him to read.

Clu reached up and took it from the Program and immediately accessed the information written on it. What he found, he liked even less than what he had learned about the Grid's status. His grip on the meditation spheres tightened as he continued to read further until it angered him to the point that no mere ball could contain it.

"Find him!" I want him found and brought back to me alive!" the corrupted Program commanded in an explosive shout of frustration and anger. The lieutenant took a tentative step back after Clu stood and whirled on him.

He bowed quickly, "At once, Excellency!" Clu paid no heed to the man as he hurried out in an attempt to avoid the system admin's wrath. But Clu was not going to vent on one of his loyal Programs. He had someone else he could redirect his anger on.

Kevin Flynn had destroyed his greatest endeavor. Everything he had worked for and created for the last thousand cycles was gone and he intended for the User to pay for it. But after he forced the man to help him save the Grid.

**The Outlands**

He dreamed of his son.

This time, though, the images he dreamt were not of memories long lost with time, but rather of events that had transpired not too long ago. Events that had cost him his freedom, a price well worth paying when it saved his son and the last ISO from the tyrannical Clu.

"_Dad we have to get your Disk," Sam said as the two walked across the maintenance walkways._

"_No, we've got to get to the portal. You shut him down from the outside," he protested as he faced his grown son. The boy did not appreciate him changing the plan again and argued against him. But Sam did not understand, could not understand._

"_Even if I I make it out, you won't last in here. Quorra won't last."_

_He reached out for his son, his hand resting on his shoulder. "Sam. Sam it will be alright, come on."_

_But his son shrugged it off as he stood his ground against his father. "Will you let it go, I am not going home without you!"_

"_Sam," he answered patiently. He was still as stubborn as he remembered him and it pleased him, made him proud even, to know that his son had not changed much in the last twenty years. He knew how to handle his son, knew how to make the boy think he was getting his way when he really was following what his father wanted. He just had to wait patiently until the lad was convinced his father saw it his way._

"_Same team, remember?" his son had thrown at him his trump card to convince his father escape was the best plan._

"_I was afraid you were gonna say that," he remembered answering and gave a resigned sigh._

"_Meet me on the flight deck in five and get us some wheels." Sam commanded and started to walk away but not before he grabbed the young man by the arm in an attempt to find out what his son was planning._

"_Wheels? What is your plan?"_

_Sam gave his father the Flynn grin as he answered, "I'm a User, I'll improvise."_

_They parted and he remembered hurrying down from the walkways to get to the main deck, all the while his mind raced on how he was going to pull this off without either Sam or Quorra knowing what he had done until it was too late. He knew his son would resent him if he ever found out, but there was no choice in the matter. Too much was at stake and even if his son managed to succeed in shutting down the Grid from his side, the time it would take him to do that, minutes, if not hours would have passed inside the Grid. Giving Clu or any of his minions a chance to stop the shutdown._

_Therefore, he had to stay behind to delay any attempts to prevent a shutdown. He also had to stop Clu and his army from making it through the Portal as well. This whole situation was convoluted enough as it is without him making these necessities more complicated. If only he could be in two places at once._

"_That's it," he said out loud in a near whisper. He had paused beside one of the many containers the solar sailor had brought to the carrier ship. He glanced inside one of them at the many programs that were going to be repurposed as the idea came to him and quickly formulated into a new plan._

_He _could_ be in two places at once._

_Kevin Flynn looked up at the command ship on it's docking tower and spotted his son riding the elevator up. He only had a few minutes remaining to do what needed to be done before his son came looking for the 'wheels' he was suppose to acquire. There was no time for him to create a new program straight from scratch and Clu would notice such an event anyway. So that left him with the option of repurposing an already existing program._

_The Creator hurried toward an access door to the container and with a few adjustments to the keypad, he was inside and making his way through the rows of inactive programs. He searched for one that was about the same height and build as he and stepped behind it. Quickly he removed it's disk from it's dock, erased the entire coding of the old program and attached it to his own dock to make it download everything he knew and that made him, him, before reattaching it to the chosen program._

_A few more adjustments and he stepped back to watch as the Program began to change its appearance as the new coding uploaded into it and overwrote the old one. When it was done, it was still inactive and he had just a little bit more adjusting to do to make this version of himself as convincing as possible before he would remove the Disk one last and final time. _

_When he was done, he rebooted the new program as he ticked off the seconds he figured he had left before Sam made it out of the tower with the master key and Quorra. While he waited, he took a few steps over to the transparent wall of the container and looked up at the tower. He could see signs of a battle going on up top as Disks bounced around inside and hoped that his son was not the one getting hit by them._

_An audible gasp turned his attention away from the tower and Kevin quickly returned to the new program's side. "How do you feel?" he asked of it and his wizened face turned to face him._

"_Apprehensive," it answered and Kevin smiled softly as he clapped the new program on the shoulder._

"_You understand your purpose?" he asked, understanding the feeling perfectly well. He was feeling the same way and was not surprised the emotion carried over._

"_Yes. I am to take your place and prevent Clu from escaping through the Portal while helping Sam and Quorra to escape. They will not like this should they discover the truth, Kevin Flynn." The other him pointed out and Kevin frowned. The Program seemed a little too stiff, too much like a program than a User._

"_I know. One second before you go, my friend." He had Flynn 2.0 turn around and he accessed the Disk again. He inputted a couple commands and glanced over the program's shoulder. "How is that?"_

"_Man, this is weird," it answered and Kevin smiled. Much better. "What will happen to you?"_

"_I intend to get off this ship before all hell breaks loose when you stop Clu," the Creator answered as he removed the Disk finally and placed it on his own dock for safe keeping. "Hopefully I'll be long gone before then."_

"_You will be trapped in here again," Flynn 2.0 reminded him and Kevin sighed sadly at the thought._

"_I know."_

"_Is there... anything you want me to say to Sam?"_

_Kevin was quiet as he considered what exactly he should have be said to his son. He walked over to the wall again and looked up at the tower. "Tell him goodbye for me." He turned back to the program and it nodded in answer before leaving him alone with the remaining inactive programs. Kevin followed after it as far as the edge of the container outside and watched as it hurried toward the flight deck and easily procured a light-plane._

_He would wait to make sure his son made it out of the tower and escaped with his doppelganger before he would find a way off of the ship himself. Kevin glanced up at the tower once more just in time to see two figures break through a window and release a Tron chute to slow his descent. _

"_Radical, man." He wondered where his son had learned that move and wished he could ask him. But he couldn't and wouldn't. To do so would compromise everything he's planned so far. Instead, he forced himself back behind the container and out of sight as he heard the light-plane ignite it's engines and roll out onto the runway. He heard more windows shattering above and caught a glimpse of five figures leaping out of the command ship._

Clu.

_He peered around to get a better look and watched as Clu and his Black Guard activated Lightjets and rapidly flew after Flynn 2.0, his son and Quorra. The fate of his family now rested in the hands of the program he had created. Once more he found himself wanting to do something to help them, but there was nothing he could do now except see to it that he escaped from the carrier ship and made it back to the Outlands and his Safehouse._

_Quickly he turned away and stamped down on the guilt and regret that was building up inside him as he made his way to the flight deck to procure one of the planes for himself or something smaller. At least he had been able to meet with his son and spend a millicycle with him for one last time. Eight hours. He would have preferred to spend the rest of his life with his son back in the real world. He had hoped he could return with his son but with the revelation of Clu's plans, everything changed._

Sometimes life has a way of moving you past wants and hopes.

_This was one time he wished that maxim was untrue. _It is a choice you made, Kevin._ He told himself while making his way over to a Black Guard sentry. The Program was unaware of his presence as he accessed it's disk and changed it's command prompts. _Had you gone, you would have died stopping Clu. This way, at least there is a small chance that you can go back one day, however slim that chance be.

"_Goodbye, kiddo." he whispered as he stole another Lightplane from the carrier ship and stole one last glance in the direction of the portal as the engines revved to life..._

Kevin Flynn slowly opened his eyes as the dream faded and he awoke to the lingering sound of the Lightplane's engines roaring in his ears. But then he frowned as he noticed that the sound had not faded with the dream. Quickly he sat up and looked around at his surroundings before he spotted the source.

A Recognizer.

He scurried for cover quickly and glanced out from behind a rock face to see what was happening. The Recognizer had it's search light active and seemed to be following a search pattern. He wondered if the pilot knew where it was looking or if it was just a random search fanning out from the Safehouse. Either way, it was far too close for comfort and he needed to get away before it flew over his campsite.

Speaking of his campsite.

The bedroll and the digital campfire would be a dead give away as to where he had been and how recently he had been there. He took one more glance at the Recognizer before determining it was safe enough for him to come out of hiding to erase any and all signs of his presence in the area. He hurried in derezzing the campfire and grabbed the bedroll before he made his way down the ravine he had been following earlier in the evening.

It seemed Clu was actively searching for him this time instead of waiting for him to make a move in their game of c_hess_. The only move he planned on making was remaining on the move until Clu gave up or his son managed to deactivate the Program from the outside.

For now he just needed to keep a distance between himself and the scouting Recognizer.

_More to come in the next chapter! I hope Flynn 2.0's resolution was convincingly plausible to all of you._


	4. Grid Troubles

_Here's the next installment, Programs!_

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**End of Line**

**Chapter Four**

_**Grid Troubles**_

**Control Center, Tron City**

"Sector C12 initiating shut down protocol," announced the feminine voice of the Grid. The System Admin growled in irritation as he turned his attention to that part of the city and watched as the lights of distant buildings began to slowly fade. He started typing rapidly into the controls to try and slow down the shut down, both to give his Programs time to escape and to delay a Grid wide blackout.

He knew what was happening and the feeling of helplessness from being unable to stop it was beyond frustrating. Add to the fact that Risk and his Black Guard have yet to find Kevin Flynn, the User he was laying the blame on for the Grid's current predicament, made his circuits misfire in irritation, figuratively speaking.

"This is the second section that has initiated a shutdown protocol in the last two microcycles," he muttered under his breath as his fingers continued to type furiously to stay ahead of it.

He hated to admit it, but he needed Kevin Flynn to stop what the man's son was doing in the User world! Without the administration powers of a User there was little he could do to save his world. If only this was another viral attack, could he do something with utmost confidence.

But this wasn't a viral attack no matter how much he wished it to be.

Clu slammed his fists in anger against the console and stared out ast his cit and watched helplessly as the last tower went out in the section. At the rate the shut down was commencing they had only eight or so microcycles remaining before a total shut down occurred.

Where in the Grid was Kevin Flynn?

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**The Outlands**

The Recognizer was a mere speck behind him as it continued it's search for him but Flynn knew it would not remain that way for very long. Not only were there other Recognizers searching for him, he could only travel so far, so fast on foot. And while theyw ere actively searching for him in the darkness of the Outlands, he could not afford to create a transport for fear of giving away his position like he nearly had with his campfire earlier. Besides it would take too long to build something like a lightcycle or a lightrunner from scratch. Precious time he did not have to waste in an attempt to travel faster. So he was left with his own booted feet to get him where he needed to go.

Kevin Flynn carefully made his way down a switchback as he thought about what he was going to do now that he was trapped inside the Grid once more, his last chance of escaping having already closed half a millicycle ago with his son and Quorra. Thinking of them had him wonder what was happening in his world. Has his precious ISO seen the sunrise like she had so often dreamed of doing? Was his son dealing with the threat of the Grid like he had promised he would do once he had reached the other side? Did they even make it before his programs reintegrated and derezzed everything within a kilocycle?

He wanted to believe so.

The Creator set foot on the bank of a nearby stream flowing through the small canyon he had descended in to and knelt down to take a drink of the luminescent energy. As he drank from the cool spring, a memory of himself and two other programs came to him.

Ram and Tron.

They had escaped the lightcycle grid and found their way to an underground well spring of energy. He wished they were here with him right now. He could have used the security of their companionship right now. Ram's enthusiasm and Tron's pragmatism would have been welcome right now but they were both gone. One had died long ago on the Encom system and the other had perished saving his life twice.

"Wish you both were here," he softly whispered in regret. He shifted to lay down on the bank and drank straight from the spring this time.

When he had his fill he followed the spring with his gaze until it had blossomed into a river and finally into Tron City. The spring was one of three that sustained both the city and those that dwell inside. He found himself staring at the city for the longest time until he realized something was not right with it.

"Odd," he muttered as he continued to stare. Then it hit him. Parts of the city was dark, it's buildings unlit and no activity could be seen in those sections that had gone dark. Something was happening on the Grid and not in the way he was expecting to happen if his son had made it out. It was as if the city was running out of energy and yet he was sitting on the bank of one of the rivers that fed the city. That river had a steady flow of energy going to it and did not look like it was going to run out any time soon.

So what was happening then?

His concerns were interrupted by the search light that shined down upon him and he snapped his gaze skyward at the Recognizer that hover over him. Where had it come from? He knew the one he had been running from had been going the opposite direction as him. His only conclusion is that this one had been following the energy, possibly thinking that he might be drawn to it and it's pilot apparently had been right.

More importantly how had he not heard it's approach?

_You were distracted by the problem on the Grid, Flynn! _He admonished himself as he bolted to his feet against aching protests and ran.


	5. Captured!

_I realize there is an inconsistency between chapters 3 and 4 and I intend to go back and correct that in chapter 3 so that the rest of this story from hence forth makes sense. Tis what I get for writing these chapters in the middle of the night at Denny's._

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><em>

**End of Line**

**Chapter Five**

_**Captured!**_

**The Outlands**

He was too old for intensive action these days. Although he really did not feel his age thanks to the physics of the Grid, in his heart he certainly felt his age. But, Kevin Flynn, did not give up. He had not given up over twenty years ago when Dillinger had stolen his creations and he was not about to give up now because a Recognizer had appeared over him and deployed sentries after him. He stole one glance over his shoulder to see where exactly those sentries were and wished he had not. They were not far behind him and appeared to be traversing the terrain a lot easier than he.

Flynn slide down a slope, disrupting pebbles and dirt as he made his way deeper into the canyon. He really needed to get out of this waiting death trap before the pilot of the Recognizer got the idea to block his escape route off. His feet landed solidly on the ground far too quickly than he would have liked and over-balanced as he sent his hands forward to stop the fall, turning it into a haphazard tumble instead.

Rock shattered where he had been a second ago and he caught the glimpse of a orange highlighted disk boomeranging back to it's owner before he sprang back to his feet and started running again. A second disk flew and bounced off the canyon wall next to him, sending shards of rock raining down on him. He ducked instinctively and wished there was more cover.

"Man, where is a cave network when you need one!" he cursed at his luck.

He heard the digitized voices of the sentries as they coordinated in cutting him off. He caught a glimpse of two climbing up the canyon wall for higher ground and Flynn knew that he was quickly losing this chase. His hopes sank even further as he heard the roar of the Recognizer as it quickly moved ahead toward a narrowed gap in the canyon. It settled down just past the bottle neck and activated a force field, essentially blocking Flynn's only means of escape that way.

The Creator skidded to a halt at the sight and blinked in amazement at the worse luck he's ever had since Clu had betrayed him all those cycles ago. "You have got to be kidding me, man!" he cried in half annoyance, half incredulity at the blockade. The hum of an approaching disk turned his attention away and he ducked just in time to avoid being hit in the chest by one of the sentries disks.

"I thought you wanted me alive!" he reached back for his own disk. Well it really wasn't his disk. It had belonged to the repurposed program he had used to impersonate him and destroy Clu. He had, of course, erased it and imprinted his own identity on it since then. So, technically, it was now his disk.

With his disk activating with a steady hum, he tossed it haphazardly at one of the approaching sentries. The guard dived out of the way and returned the favor with his own in which Kevin Flynn barely managed to get out of its path before it had the chance to slice into him. Although the disk could not instantly derezz him, it could cause injuries that would eventually lead to his deresolution.

To death.

Something he wanted to avoid immensely right now.

His disk returned to him and he backed away further, quickly trying to devise a plan on how he was going to get out of this situation. _Tron where are you? I need you, buddy! _But Tron was gone. Clu had derezzed him, not once, but twice; and as far as Flynn knew the security program was at the bottom of the Sea of Simulation, gone forever.

As another disk came his way, no plan had come to him quickly enough and that left him with the only option of fighting back until he couldn't fight no more. "Well, you always wanted to go out in a blaze of glory, Flynn," he said out loud and tossed his disk again, this time purposely missing the sentry he was aiming for and watched for a second as it ricocheted off the canyon wall and came curving back. It's return trip caught the sentry by surprise and it cried out as it's stability came undone and it derezzed.

But before he could catch his returning disk, his world exploded in pain and a bright white light. The Creator cried out as he felt his knees buckle underneath him and dropped to the uneven ground. He keeled forward onto his hands and tried to catch the breath that had been zapped out of him. He briefly registered that something had hit him in the back and it had hurt like the dickens. _Crap, the two that took the high road double backed behind me, _he realized a little too late.

The sentry behind him raised his staff again and brought it's electrified tip down upon the Creator once more, sending another agonizing jolt of electricity through him. Kevin Flynn collapsed to the ground, holding his own chest as his body spasmed a couple times. When he did not attempt to get back up, the program merely held the tip in his direction as if it was enough to keep the User from considering about escape.

Once the others caught up, they grabbed him by his arms and hauled him to his feet. Binders were placed on his wrists behind his back and Flynn found himself being roughly escorted to the Recognizer. _Man, maybe switching places with a double wasn't such a good idea after all._

He worried what Clu was going to do to him once he was finally brought to the rogue program. He also worried if he would have an opportunity to escape. The last several times he had managed to escape any tyrannical program and it's minions he had help. He had Tron, Ram, Quorra or Sam at his side. This time, he was alone and he seriously doubted that he was going to get any help from any of the programs serving Clu.

_You're a User, improvise._

**Central Control, Tron City**

"They have him, sir," informed an assistant program from behind Clu. The System Admin stopped in what he was doing to face the program with a look that pretty much told the assistant that he had just given his superior the best news on the Grid ever.

"Where is he now?" Clu inquired impatiently.

"He is being brought here now, sir." The program consulted a databyte in his hands before continuing forward with the answer to the next obvious question he was likely to be asked by Clu. "Estimated arrival is in two microcycles."

"Excellent! Have him brought to me the moment they arrive with him." Clu turned away from the program again and faced the control screens he had been working on before the interruption. He had managed to slow the inevitable shutdown of the Grid and buy himself more time to come up with a solution, but he knew he could not do that by himself. He did not have the administration rights to do it. Those rights were something only a User had. He only had one problem in achieving that goal.

He knew Flynn was not going to cooperate.

So he was going to need an incentive to make him cooperate somehow. _What can I say or do that would convince the User to do as I command? _The only cards he once had were now gone, having escaped through the portal back to the User world. As he thought about it, he wondered if Flynn knew that they had succeeded in escaping before the derezzing of everything in the area. Hell, even he wasn't sure if they had managed to escape. He was only assuming based on the facts he knew of.

_If they hadn't, then they were most likely derezzed with my previous version. _Clu typed in a command to deal with a blinking indicator across one of the sectors in the city. The directive he created to monitor power losses on the Grid was keeping him ahead of the shutdown and letting him delay it as long as possible, but he knew that the next sector to go was going to be much, much closer to the center of the city. If he did not come up with a way to convince Kevin Flynn to help...

He did not want to think of failure. He was Clu. He did not fail and he was not about to let the Users to defeat him so easily. He had not come up with the End of Line subroutine to reboot his coding into a repurposed program just so he could be deactivated from the outside.

"Damn you Flynns!" he growled as the next sector began to shut down one building and program at a time.


End file.
